halley' s cometBY: ROSEMARIE PARKER

The Moon almost ruined this photograph. During late March and early April 1997, Comet Hale-Bopp passed nearly in front of the Andromeda Galaxy.

this is what Halley's comet looks like

these are pictures of Halley's comet

A comet is an icy body that releases gas or dust. They are often compared to dirty snowballs, though recent research has led some scientists to call them snowy dirtballs. Comets contain dust, ice, carbon dioxide, ammonia, methane and more. Astronomers think comets are leftovers from the gas, dust, ice and rocks that initially formed the solar system about 4.6 billion years ago.

Chinese astronomers recorded its passage in the Shih Chi and Wen Hsien Thung Khao chronicles

heir annals for 164 BC and 87 BC contain unmistakable references to a comet that can only be Halley’s putting in its regular appearances according to the schedule established by Yeomans and Kiang. It is a remarkable fact that observations made with the naked eye 2000 years ago, and impressed into clay tablets in cuneiform script, are still of value in this day of high-speed computers and space probes.

More recently, we know that it was Halley’s Comet in 1066 that tolled the knell for King Harold at the Battle of Hastings. Its depiction on the Bayeux Tapestry, being pointed out to King Harold by his worried aides, is perhaps the most famous image of a comet in history. An earlier appearance of Halley’s Comet, in AD 684, is illustrated in the Nuremberg Chronicle, but this book was not published until 1493, and the simple woodcut is merely an artist’s impression made 800 years after the fact. According to the Chronicle’s accompanying text, the Comet’s appearance was followed by three months of rain and storms, culminating in plague.

Halley didn't live to see the comet's return, but his discovery led to the comet being named after him. (The traditional pronunciation of the name usually rhymes with valley.)